


Renegades Wear Tweed

by Crollalanza



Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Alcohol, Beginnings, M/M, bar au
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-23
Updated: 2015-12-23
Packaged: 2018-05-08 16:32:57
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,161
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5504843
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Crollalanza/pseuds/Crollalanza
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Ennoshita Chikara was about to clock off when the stranger stomped the snow off his shoes as he entered the bar. And when he ordered, he realised they shared a taste in drinks.</p>
<p>Okay, so it was hardly a substantial basis for a relationship ...</p>
<p>But maybe it was a start.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Renegades Wear Tweed

**Author's Note:**

  * For [renaissance](https://archiveofourown.org/users/renaissance/gifts).



> This is a gift for memorde. 
> 
> I think she'll work out half way through who's written this, if not before. 
> 
> Anyway, have a very happy Christmas and a great New Year. Keep writing because you're brilliant.

It had been a busy lunchtime session at the Vesper Bar, busier than usual even for the time of year, and Chikara was looking forward to clocking off. At least now it was quieter, the customers having left full of alcoholic cheer to fortify them against the snow falling outside. However, his feet ached from standing and his face from smiling, so the one thing he really wanted was to get home and soak in a hot bath.

The bell ringing over the door brought him out of his reverie.  With the company mantra of ‘Service with a Smile’ bombarding his thoughts, he fixed a rictus grin on his face, ready to greet whoever had walked in. But the guy sidling up to the bar, having stomped the ice off his shoes, wasn’t a regular, so almost by rote, despite his weariness, Chikara launched into the usual game.

“Newbie alert, what do you reckon?” he whispered, nudging Hisashi.

Hisashi narrowed his eyes, making his instant assessment, an assessment that Chikara knew might be unfair but could be uncannily accurate. “Tall. Keeps flicking his hair – idiot.  Expensive suit. Confident.”

“Mmm, I thought that. He’s not looking uncomfortable.” Chikara pressed his lips together, and tilted his head to the side as he took in the stranger.  “Wonder if he’s waiting for someone,” he mused, hoping he’d made that sound casual.

“What difference does that -”Hisashi started to say, then nodded. “Oh... yeah, I guess he might order a jug rather than just a glass.”

“Okay... he’s signalling for us. What’s your guess?”

“I’m going for a Stardust,” Hisashi muttered. “He looks like a tosser with a lot of money.”

Chikara frowned a little. Was the guy a tosser? True he seemed to have a perpetual look of amusement on his face, but maybe he _was_ just perpetually amused, and wasn’t that a good thing? It was like people telling him to wake up all the time when he was perfectly conscious.

The customer flicked his hair again, and when it fell back across his eyes, he smoothed it back, really slowly, with his fingers.

“Dirty Martini,” Chikara decided, and ignoring Hisashi’s mutter of ‘you wish’, he stepped across to serve him, a smile on his lips. “What can I get you, sir?”

The stranger smiled at him, and then he stared, and his smile stopped being a smirk as his jaw dropped a little. “Uh... sherry, please,” he said.

“Sherry?” Chikara blinked.

“Is that a problem?”

The guy shifted on the stool and for one awful moment, Chikara thought he must of offended him because he looked as if he was going to get up and leave, but he stayed, looking up at him quizzically.

“We have sherry,” Chikara assured him. “Which type?”

 “Amontillado, if you have it?”

“We have it. It’s one of my favourites.” As he stretched up for the bottle, Chikara grinned. “Like it dry, huh?”

The stranger waited for Chikara to pour, took a sip and then slowly licked his lips. “Sherry, yeah. And ... uh ... humour,” he said as an afterthought, and pulled out his wallet. “Want to join me?”

Raising his eyebrows, Chikara gestured with his hand. “I’m working in case you hadn’t realised. That’s why I’m this side of the bar.”

With a smile, the guy twisted his head round, taking in exactly the same scene as Chikara, a bar with precious few customers, and no one else asking for service. “You could have one, surely?”

It was Vesper’s staff custom to accept any drinks, telling the buyer they’d have it later. The money would be placed it in a jar, and put towards a decent night out for everyone. So, nodding (despite a faint feeling of regret) Chikara said, “I’ll have it later, if that’s all right with you.”

“Hmm.” He screwed up his face, little wrinkles appearing in his nose and a small but definite pout appearing on his lips. “I’m after company, though, and someone else that likes sherry.” And then he grinned. “We’re a dying breed, you know.”

“Sherry drinkers under the age of seventy, you mean?”

“You got me, Barman-chan.”

And it certainly wasn’t because of his smile, or the yen he was pushing across the bar, that Chikara felt unaccountably thirsty. More the way he was peeping up at him, a hint of mischief in his eyes.

It had been a while since someone had looked at him that way. And it had been forever since he’d felt such a palpable connection with someone that good looking. Even if it was just over sherry.

_Sherry that’s the exact colour of your eyes_ , _Stranger-san_ , he thought idly.

 “Why not?” Chikara agreed. He flashed Hisashi an apologetic  glance, noting he was staring at the exchange, shrugging when he saw Chikara pour the second drink.

“Your co-worker doesn’t approve. Am I getting you into trouble?”

He bit back the response of ‘Not yet’ instead saying, “I’m allowed a drink. It’s not a problem.”

“Oh, then it’s me he doesn’t approve of. Is that because I’m a stranger?” He laughed and leant closer. “Can’t have that, I’m Futakuchi Kenji.”

“Ennoshita Chikara,” he replied, inclining his head. He took a sip of the sherry, delighting in its warmth and the tingle on his tongue. “He’s just irritated he was wrong, that’s all.”

“Wrong about what?” Futakuchi held his gaze.

“Your drink. It’s a game we play. He thought you’d order a Stardust. It’s our most expensive drink.”

Again he screwed up his nose. “He really doesn’t like me at all, does he?” he queried, then asked, “What about you?”

“I had you down as a martini drinker,” he said vaguely, trying to will away the blush on his cheeks because adding the word ‘dirty’ seemed suddenly both highly inappropriate and appropriate.

“Because I remind you of James Bond?”

“Something like that,” he said gratefully.

“Must be my brooding good looks and air of mystery,” Futakuchi said, affecting a scowl.

“Nope.”

He unknotted his eyebrows, sipping more of his sherry. “Uh... then it was because I leave you ‘shaken and stirred’?”

Chikara barked out a laugh. “You think a lot of yourself, don’t you?”

“Hey, you called me James Bond!”

“No, I didn’t. And it’s ‘shaken, _not_ stirred’.”

He shrugged. “Same difference. I mean it all gets mixed up, doesn’t it.”Then he stopped talking, sipping more of the sherry. “Why the martini? Why did you look at me and think of that rather than sherry?”

“Ah, well, I could tell you,” Chikara murmured, bending forward, “but then-”

“You’d have to kill me, huh?” Futakuchi whispered as he propped his elbows on the bar, resting his chin in his hands. “So ... you’re the spy.”

Chikara winked. “That’s me, all right. The spy -”

“Who loved me?” Futakuchi licked his upper lip.

Snorting, Chikara studied his glass wondering whether to swig it and move on or savour the taste and the conversation. 

“Hey, don’t go quiet on me, Barman-chan. I’d like to know why you thought I’d order martini.”

“Even though it could cost you your life,” Chikara said gravely.

“Might be a good way to die at your hands,” he replied. And now there was no holding back – the words a definite come on. The twinkle in his eye holding more of a promise than a suggestion.

Chikara eyed him meditatively. He wondered at the glint in Futakuchi’s expression, whether this was the briefest of flirtations to pass the time in a bored businessman’s life, or whether it was loneliness and a very real need to for human contact that had brought him to the bar.

He drained his glass, setting it down next to Futakuchi’s. “My shift finished five minutes ago.”

With a slight pout, Futakuchi sighed. “Are you about to go home and leave me here with a barman who thinks I’ll drink overpriced cocktails because of the way I dress?”

He shook his head.“There’s still a storm outside, so I was wondering if you’d like me to buy you a drink, that’s all. Sherry or martini - it’s up to you.”

Futakuchi grimaced. “What is it with you and martinis? Do I have some kind of sign on my head? I hate vermouth. And olives – ughhh!”

“Then why are you here?”Hisashi interrupted, making both of them flinch.

“Um... because it’s cold?” Futakuchi said and held out his hands. “I forgot my gloves and it’s icy out there. Anyway...” he frowned at Hisashi, “Why shouldn’t I be here?”

Rolling his eyes, Hisashi turned away. “Tell him, Chikara. Maybe over another drink as both of you seem to like that muck so much.”

Removing his apron, giving Futakuchi a small smile, Chikara poured two more sherries, then joined him on the other side of the bar. He pulled up a bar stool, knocking his knees against Futakuchi’s as he picked up his glass.

“Cheers,” he said.

But Futakuchi didn’t respond. Instead, he stared at Chikara. “I still don’t get why that guy’s surprised I’m here.”

His lips twitching, Chikara grinned. “This is a martini bar. We’re not used to renegades ordering old lady drinks.”

“Really?”  His eyes were wide, his mouth making an ‘o’ as he glanced at the coasters on the bar, picking one up to study it closer. “’Vesper Bar’ ... Ah, I get it – that’s the James Bond drink, isn’t it?” He sighed and shook his head. “I had no idea.”

“There’s a pink neon sign about a meter high on the wall,” Chikara laughed.

“Well, yeah, but I had my head down, and it was snowing. I ducked in here, saw you ... uh ... saw you weren’t busy and thought I’d have a drink,” Futakuchi huffed. His face fell. “Fuck, I’m an idiot! All that stuff about being Bond, and you’d just decided I was a martini drinker because of the bar. ”

Chikara sighed. “Mostly everyone is. We get flash poseurs ordering martinis with gold leaf floating on the surface. And then others want only the best Russian vodka, or ice cubes made from the freshly melted snow of the Himalayas.”

“They do what?” The grin was back on his face.

“The olives have to be imported from a certain village in Italy, five kilometres from the sea, so the air is salty but not too overpowering,” Chikara replied, warming to his subject. “And the cocktail sticks crafted from the tallest redwood in-”

“Fuck off!”  Futakuchi giggled, his laughter irrepressible.  Then he raised his small glass to his lips, sticking out his little finger as if drinking tea from a delicate china cup, and sighed petulantly. “I’m clearly not at all cool.”

“Me, either.”

“As it is,” Futakuchi continued, “we’re both old ladies dressed in tweed at a shooting party.”

Imitating him, Chikara pursed his lips. “Personally, I believe sherry’s so out it’s in,” he replied. “We’re at the vanguard of a drinks revolution, Futakuchi-san, and they’ll be dedicating drinking songs to us before the year is out.” 

There was a pause. Futakuchi looked up at the ceiling, and Chikara could see the exact moment the idea hit him. He waited as Futakuchi hesitated, considering his words so very carefully. “Then maybe we should see the New Year in together,” he murmured at last, and now his cheeks had begun to pink. “Just to oversee the proceedings, you understand.”

Chinking glasses, they held each other’s gaze for just a little longer than necessary.  “An excellent idea,” Chikara replied and began to smile. “Over sherry, naturally.”

With a flicker of a grin, Futakuchi picked up the drinks menu, leafing through the pages. He coughed, clearing his throat. “So ... um ... you said you thought I’d order a martini, and there are loads here. Which one?”

“Uh...” Chikara could feel the colour flaring across his face.

“You’re not going to tell me it’s an Appletini, are you?  That makes me sound really sad.”

“N-no, not that one.” He gulped at his sherry, taking far more than he should and started to cough.

Futakuchi thumped him on the back and waited for the spluttering to subside. “Are you going to tell me?” he asked, leaving his hand on Chikara’s shoulder blade.

“Dirty,” Chikara muttered, then raised his eyes staring directly at him. “It’s a martini made with olive juice brine.”

“Ughh!  Sounds revolting.”  He grimaced, removing his hand. “You thought I’d drink that? Not exactly a compliment, you thinking I’m some kind of ... What?  Octopus? Shark? Plankton?” 

“N-no, not at all,” Chikara assured him. “I mean this is all done on first impressions and assumptions. I saw the attitude, the confidence as you walked in, and I thought ... uh...”

“You thought what?”

“Salty,” Chikara replied, adding a small grin.

“Oh...” The smirk returned. “Barman-chan, you’re quite ... perceptive.”

“Am I?”

“Mmm, and if drinks truly reflected our personalities, then ... I’d be ordering Dirty Martinis all the time,” he said and gave a very slow wink, displaying rather long lashes fluttering across his cheek. “But _only_  if you made them.”

 


End file.
